iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Petey and his squeaky chicken are looking for their forever home! Petey is located in South Dakota. He loves car rides, so if you need to make a road trip to get this boy, he would think it's the best thing ever to travel home with you. (His adoption profile is in the comments.) #dogsofbluesky

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

Thanks to A Mighty Girl on Facebook for highlighting this quote.

“Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears. To be led by a food is to be led by the opportunists who control the fool. To be led by a thief is to offer up your most precious treasures to be stolen. To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies. To be led by a tyrant is to sell yourself and those you live into slavery.” - Octavia Butler

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 06/02/2026

There has long existed in America a conundrum of Blacks and the military...A nation that had enslaved Blacks would come to call upon them during the Civil War to save America. Those Black soldiers—told by Confederate forces they’d be hanged if captured—served with distinction.

lithub.com

Fighting Abroad and At Home: Remembering the Experiences of Black Vietnam Veterans

If you were a twelve-year-old kid, as I was in the summer of 1966, N. Fifth Street in Columbus, Ohio seemed a bucolic place. Every neighborhood kid seemed to have a bicycle. Trees shaded homes. Men…

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 29/01/2026

"In 2022...Noem singled me out by name, accusing me of having an agenda and being unfair. That tactic did not come from South Dakota’s political tradition. It came straight from a national playbook designed to weaken trust in journalism."

angelakennecke.substack.com

This Is What the Breakdown of Accountability Looks Like: My History with Kristi Noem

My History with Kristi Noem

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 26/01/2026

The graphic novel version of Timothy Snyder’s “On Tyranny” was released in 2021, but I recently discovered it existed and requested that my library acquire it for their collection. They did, and I’m currently reading it. This version is quite powerful with the added photos and illustrations.

Cover of “On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From The Twentieth Century” graphic edition by Timothy Snyder and illustrated by Nora Krug. Illustration shows a white paper mask face floating above a body in black clothing.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 26/01/2026

"Those who support or excuse this campaign of terror and civil rights abuses, say: Why can’t you simply comply with these officers? They’re just doing their jobs. As if better compliance is the root issue with asking someone to show papers based on skin color."

lithub.com

Letter From Minnesota: Can You Hear Us, America?

Since early December of last year, thousands of ICE officers have streamed into Minnesota to carry out a violent and grossly unconstitutional campaign of state intimidation upon the people of Minne…

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Reposted by Amy G. Nelson

MinnMax @minnmax.com · 23/01/2026

In solidarity with today's ICE OUT OF MINNESOTA blackout, MinnMax is donating $1 to the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota for every share of this Bluesky post for the next hour.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 13/01/2026

Minnesota author Kent Nerburn on Facebook, after attending protests in Minneapolis: "Trump, in his tiny vicious rage, hoped his oafish Brownshirts would create chaos. Instead, in this corner of America, on this particular day, they were creating community." www.facebook.com/knerburn

Kent Nerburn and son holding a red banner with the word “LIES” in white lettering at a protest in Minneapolis.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 07/01/2026

I think @terrymoranabc.bsky.social has the right idea of breaking up the onslaught of horrific news from the regime with regular poetry breaks. I needed this palate cleanser today.

The Peace of Wild Things

When despair grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars

waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Wendell Berry

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 27/12/2025

Sunrise on the Missouri River near Yankton, South Dakota. Saturday, December 27, 2025.

The pale light of a winter sunrise accompanies gray skies as the calm, glassy surface of the Missouri River reflects those clouds and the trees lining the shore.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 14/12/2025

"'The fact is that we did it,' Murdoch M. Wood said, 'and I then came to the conclusion that I have held very firmly ever since, that if we had been left to ourselves there would never have been another shot fired.'"

atticplanet.space

Silent Night, Peaceful Night — Attic Planet

On Christmas Eve 1914, the guns stopped, the front fell still, and the soldiers came out of the trenches. . .

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 03/12/2025

"To call such people ‘garbage' is not just a lie. It is a moral disgrace. It is the language of someone who wants to divide Americans into those who belong and those who can be discarded. It stems from the mind and heart of a man who treats human beings as refuse."

open.substack.com

Dragging America Down to His Level

No human being should be called "garbage." But Trump's second term is trashing our country.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 29/11/2025

Rapid City, South Dakota, has a number of statues of presidents in the downtown area called City of Presidents. They recently installed a statue of Trump. Some residents are making it clear how they feel about that. Photo courtesy of the Indivisible 605 Facebook group.

Statue of Donald Trump in downtown Rapid City, South Dakota, sports a traffic cone - aka dunce cap.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 25/11/2025

"I suspect Trump and the assholes at his side are no match for Elissa Slotkin, Jason Crow, Mark Kelly, Maggie Goodlander, Chrissy Houlahan and Chris Deluzio, the senators and congress members in the video. They’ve actually read, understood and know how to fight for our Constitution."

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 21/11/2025

R/T John Roedel via Facebook Many more gems found @johnroedel.bsky.social.

My love,
I know I haven’t
been okay for a long time.
It felt like I had
lost my way forward.
That wasn’t it.
I just lost
the why I am here.
I will chase it again.
Don’t worry, I will
be me again soon.
-love
John Roedel

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 02/10/2025

"South Dakota women are imprisoned at a rate of 338 per 100,000. That’s a higher rate than Montana or Idaho...All three states have higher rates than El Salvador, the country with the highest incarceration rate. The nationwide incarceration rate for women in the U.S. is 112 per 100,000."

southdakotasearchlight.com

South Dakota locks up women at a higher rate than any other state, report says • South Dakota Searchlight

South Dakota incarcerates women at a higher rate than other U.S. states — and countries — according to a new report from the Prison Policy Initiative.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 01/10/2025

A bit of good news! "In a little over two months, South Dakota Public Broadcasting raised $1.6 million to help keep its staff after losing federal funding. In July, SDPB announced it lost 100% of its federal funds, which amounts to around $2.3 million annually and around 22% of its entire budget."

keloland.com

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 30/09/2025

“‘Motherf***ing wind farms. Loud, ugly, harmful to nature,' he says, then pauses and shakes his head. 'Who says that? These giants are standing tall against fossil fuels, rising up from the ocean like a middle finger to CO2.’"

open.substack.com

Samuel L. Jackson, with few choice words for Trump

Watch the Snakes on Plane star take on the snake in the Oval Office

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 28/09/2025

"On trumpet, Ernestine ‘Tiny' Davis was 'the female Louis Armstrong.' When she played in DC, Armstrong himself offered her five times her meager Sweethearts salary to join his band. She refused. ‘Well,' Davis recalled, 'I just loved them gals too much.’"

theattic.space

SWINGIN' WITH THE SWEETHEARTS

Big Bands were all male, all white. Then from the shadows of Jim Crow came the International Sweethearts of Rhythm.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 18/09/2025

"The promoters of Christian nationalism seek a dangerous convergence of government and religion. Christian religion, of course. "We have seen what happens in other countries where religion and government become one. We should never want that here."

southdakotasearchlight.com

Beware of Christian nationalism, even on a T-shirt • South Dakota Searchlight

The promoters of Christian nationalism seek a dangerous convergence of government and religion. Christian religion, of course.

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Reposted by Amy G. Nelson

fightthefire.bsky.social @fightthefire.bsky.social · 08/09/2025

New at Fight the Fire: An unprecedented look at Trump’s unprecedented level of claims about unprecedented stuff. Trust us, you’ve never seen anything like it, at least since the last time you never saw anything like it.

fightthefire.substack.com

An unprecedented look at Trump’s unprecedented level of claims about unprecedented stuff

Trust us, you’ve never seen anything like it, at least since the last time you never saw anything like it

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 20/08/2025

Perhaps we should also paint tunnels on the wall so unsuspecting immigrants run right into it (aka Roadrunner vs. Coyote?) My god, this truly is the stupidest timeline.

thehill.com

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 17/08/2025

“'There are a couple of takeaways here,' Binion writes. 'One: People still go to Subway. Did not know that. Two: The government's disproportionate response to this offense epitomizes why Trump's plan appears to be, at least for now, more political theater than a real solutions-oriented approach.'”

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 14/08/2025

“'Arrests will occur at night, in an effort to avoid news cameras,' Jesse Rabinowitz, communications director at National Homelessness Law Center, said via email."

motherjones.com

Trump plans raids on DC's homeless tonight, sources say

Advocates are scrambling to relocate people from tent encampments before imminent arrests.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 10/08/2025

"Thanks for enthralling us with what might be. Thanks for warning us against turning ourselves over to, or into, machines. From Fahrenheit 451: 'Stuff your eyes with wonder. Live as if you’d drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It’s more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories.'”

theattic.space

AUGUST ENCORE: THANK YOU, RAY BRADBURY!

Born into a world of radios and Model T’s, he envisioned a fantastic future. And you can’t say he didn’t warn us.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

“'This is what happens when you put the wrong people in charge,' said state House Minority Leader Erin Healy, D-Sioux Falls, who voted against the bill. 'We talk a lot about freedom and privacy in this state, so it’s a shame that this legislation led to this type of breach.’"

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Reposted by Amy G. Nelson

Jess Piper @piperformissouri.bsky.social · 30/07/2025

The price of 1 lb of ground beef is now higher than the federal minimum hourly wage…

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 29/07/2025

H/t Intersectional Memes and Feminist Dreams on Facebook.

Girls will be like "I needed this."
And it's literally just a road trip to Florida to burn down a concentration camp.

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Reposted by Amy G. Nelson

South Dakota Voices for Peace @sdvfpeace.bsky.social · 28/07/2025

Message from Taneeza Islam, SDVFP CEO:

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 27/07/2025

"Former Gov. Kristi Noem had proposed an evisceration of SDPB’s state-level funding before her departure to join President Donald Trump’s cabinet as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. State lawmakers rejected those efforts."

southdakotasearchlight.com

Local public broadcasting cuts will happen Oct. 31 without new funding, director says • South Dakota Searchlight

SIOUX FALLS – South Dakotans should know what might stay and what might go at South Dakota Public Broadcasting within the next two weeks.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 27/07/2025

Loved the latest from @robwhart.bsky.social. It’s a thrill to find a book that draws you in and lets you fall in love with the characters. But, using “Come On Eileen” (Dexys Midnight Runners) as a means of torture? Come on! That one is my “Kids, we’re not leaving the car until it's over” song. 💙📚

Cover of The Medusa Protocol by Rob Hart. Cover has a neon green background with a “Wish You Were Here” postcard postmarked Brazil. There is a knife stuck through the middle of the postcard, and a butterfly resting on the end of the knife’s handle.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 27/07/2025

Found some bird's nest fungi in one of my flower beds. I haven't been very eloquent or loud in expressing my outrage lately, so I wanted to offer a palate cleanser to those who are doing a much better job. Thank you.

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 17/07/2025

Today I found out that my 16-year-old considers Wuthering Heights one of her favorite books because “I love when no one is normal in a story" and that she discovered it thanks to the Kate Bush song. For some reason, this makes me so very happy. I’ve really needed a moment like this. 💙📚#booksky

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Amy G. Nelson @amygrevenelson.bsky.social · 17/07/2025

I have been feeling this so keenly lately. Good reminder to not give up and become complacent.

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